A Nascent Kaleidoscope

Chapter 557:

Chapter 557:

"If you break that barrel, you're not drinking anything but sea water you idiot!" Nurarihyon was slapping his cane against the back – rather lightly – of one of his men as they rolled up a barrel of water onto my parked ship.

They were loading it up with everything we might need.

Obviously, I could carry everything myself, but it would be foolish to not have multiple points of failure. What if I got whisked away for whatever reason and they were stuck for a while?

We were being careful; I was being careful.

I couldn't throw caution to the wind like I did when I only had to care about myself. Behind me was the entirety of the Youkai army even if I wasn't one of the 'generals'.

I didn't have much to do. Honestly, I didn't have very many responsibilities in the first place. I was not a...leader in this venture. I fumbled through it back in Chaldea, but I was not the type of person to be leading large groups.

I knew what I was good at. I would let them all tell me where to go and what to do, and I could even handle curve balls thrown my way. Maybe that endeared me more to the Youkai around here as I never once tried to flex my 'authority' over them as Yasaka's lover.

Funny enough, they all seemed to genuinely recognize my authority in that regard. If I asked for something, no one would question me, and it would get done.

Maybe it was something I should talk to Venelana about the next time I sat down with her. She's always great when I felt like I need to speak about certain things and maybe my despise for leadership positions came from somewhere.

Regardless, I didn't dwell too much on it because this was neither the time nor the place.

While Nurarihyon and his lot were loading up the ship, I found my Raikou off to the side, watching other things and I walked up to her silently wrapping my arms around her waist.

I didn't need to see her face to know she was smiling, I could feel her shift in my arms and happily accept the affection.

"You know you don't have to do this." I spoke to her, not very loud, just enough for both of us to hear. "Being here in a war, fighting and killing enemies."

Raikou didn't like killing.

Oh, she loved to fight. The rare times where she was arrogant were when it came to her martial prowess. Hell, she sparred with Artoria and Scáthach all the time. And honestly, she's probably the most talented of the three, and they're so ridiculous in that regard that I can only look up to them in terms of pure skill.

Sure, Scáthach still was more skillful than her, but Scáthach also lived for thousands of years.

And I've heard on more than one occasion of Scáthach huffing about how talented Raikou truly was.

"It's alright, Master, I want to be here." She shifted around in my grasp so she was facing me and I could see her beautiful smile.

"I just don't want you to force yourself to do something you hate." Because that's exactly what she would do, and I promised to make her happy.

"Master, look at that Youkai over there." She directed me towards where she was pointing.

"I see him." He was a sort of aquatic Youkai, I couldn't tell at just a glance.

"Itoh Yishio. His wife is a human and they own a sandwich restaurant. I look after their son at school." She then gently guided my head towards another. "Tada Rokuro, he adopted his deceased brother's daughter twelve years ago and he works as one of Yasaka's guards. Hora Kazuki, Goro, Masumi, Nagata Kin." She started pointing out a lot of people. "Master, this is my home as well." She finished, looking at me with that same beautiful smile.

Right….I suppose it was.

I felt a familiar presence grab hold of my ponytail, pulling on it lightly. "Student, what is this I hear about you going off to cause some mischief?"

I leaned my head back to look at her without letting Raikou out of my grasp. "I am going on a sanctioned mission from Yasaka." I defended myself.

Scáthach snorted, pulling the piece of fabric binding my hair off, letting my hair fall out of place. "Stand still, you were a mess, I will correct it." She grabbed my hair straightening it out properly before retying it herself.

It felt nice being taken care of like this.

"I'll be gone for a few days at a minimum." I let out, letting my hand fall down into Raikou's ample cleavage.

"We will persist without you." Raikou reassured me.

"Worry yourself not, student, everyone shall be looked after." Scáthach also had a warm and gentle tone.

"Is Jeanne still around?" I had been busy as we immediately spearheaded into the Fae Realms that I hadn't had time to check on her.

"Those of her faith have departed bar a handful that remained to bear witness to the warring. However, the young lass has taken to providing assistance other than combat. She tends to the wounded and handles other matters." Scáthach replied.

Good, that's good.

Jeanne didn't need to be fighting and killing. Despite the fact that she had fought in war all her life, I don't feel like she belonged anyways near this kind of death. She was far too pure and bright to be dragged down by this kind of thing despite the reasoning or cause.

"Jinn too?"

"Aye, she is using her new status as a Goddess to reinforce the Magics that protect this place. She has no stomach for killing unless it's absolutely needed."

I knew that already as well.

Jinn wasn't even one for sparring most of the time. She did so every now and then, to practice or keep in 'shape' for whatever that term meant for her, but she did not like conflict in any real form.

She was a very gentle girl, and I would prefer her to remain her way. Ironic considering that she's technically a Norse goddess now and they're a warlike culture.

I knew I didn't even need to ask for her to look after them, she would do so by her own hand.

And it was about time to say goodbye based on the shouts I heard from Nurarihyon to his men.

"That thing you did where you created a copy of Gae Bolg for Kunou, can you tell me in detail how you did it?"

"Curious about that, my student?" Scáthach let out a chuckle. "It will be difficult for you to replicate as you never experienced crafting the original."

I waved my hand through the air as if to deny her first thought. "I had an idea for a new spell, and I thought that would be a good place to start."

"Delay your departure by thirty minutes and I can prepare something in writing for you to read at your leisure." Her hand ran through my hair.

I just pushed my head further into Raikou's chest.

I could certainly do that.

@***@

A last wave goodbye to everyone on the ground and my ship took to the air. Granted, we didn't go too high because of various….problems with flying here.

The Sky wasn't connected to the Earth.

I made sure to let everyone know that numerous times because many Youkai were just so used to taking to the air in their daily lives.

Essentially, Space and Time in this realm was mangled in certain places. What constituted physics in the normal world did not operate the same here.

Going up didn't always mean you go up.

My Authority was negating any such effects over the encampment and my general Authority let me navigate things with a certain assurance if I was going to fly I would go up….but just to be safe, I was keeping rather close to the ground.

Vivian briefly said an offhanded comment about how the 'Earth' and the 'Sky' were two separate domains.

That was not at all a whimsical or romanticized comment.

You could consider them two different 'worlds'.

I set Sir Wiggles down on the wheel, with his proper Pirate's hat on of course.

Despite how I usually did it just to amuse myself, he could actually navigate the ship rather well.

I walked down onto the main deck and looked over everything.

Quite a few Youkai were peering over the edge watching the scenery pass by.

"Bit cramped." Nurarihyon appeared at my side grunting as he looked off towards the horizon.

Atleast, I think it was the horizon, I wasn't taking anything for granted here.

"My ship is decently sized, but it's not meant to house nearly a hundred Youkai of varying size and shape." I gestured to Aotab? who had to awkwardly crouch to get through the threshold coming up from the deck.

Space was…limited. He was right, it was extremely cramped. To the point where I would be sharing my 'captain's cabin' with the old man and his high seats.

I didn't like doing so, but I understood the necessity.

We needed a lot of people because our purpose was to steal as many ships as possible for our army to sail over this odd sea we've heard about.

"How are we supposed to call ourselves the Hyakki Yagy? without a hundred of us!?" He huffed indignantly.

Yes, who could argue with that logic.

I merely rolled my eyes considering he brought far more than 100 to the Fae realms in general and that it hasn't been only 100 in a very long time.

I pulled out a copy of the map Vivian passed over, making sure to note that the terrain was as it showed, marking down when we passed by a mountain a fair distance to the east and various other forests and landscapes.

I also made sure to mark down any structures or settlements that I could glimpse even if we didn't directly pass by them.

Better to err on the side of caution in case they get held back and we end up finishing way before they made it to us. That way they would have a more descriptive map when we got back.

And I could very well send them a picture through the Kaleidophone, though the 'reception' here was….spotty.

It couldn't be helped, you can account for temporal fluctuations, and special fluctuations, but it was hard to account for a constant jumbled mess of those two that constantly shifts whenever it feels like.

"Oi brat, what's that?" Nurarihyon grabbed my attention, pointing ahead.

He had great eyesight because I had to reinforce my eyes to see what he was talking about.

I stared at it for a few moments and I was about to open my mouth to respond until my eyes widened and with quick reflexes, I already had Mirage in my hand, swinging through the air.

There was the distinct clang of me hitting something, and with my Reinforced eyesight, I could track the movement and the 'projectile' I just connected with.

As if in slow motion, I watched a seed, not dissimilar from an Acorn, as its shape distorted on the flat of my sword from impact, deflected to the side, hitting the flooring of my ship.

Everyone on the deck of the ship froze, looking at me, then at the spot there the wood had a small indentation and slowly, something green sprouted up.

And by sprouted, I mean, it shot up out of the seed and grew into a foot tall plant with a very noticeable sharp toothed maw. It was eating into my ship to grow!

It was feeding on the Magic and the Wood!

I quickly shot a bolt of lightning at it, disintegrating it to pieces.

"Prepare for battle." My voice boomed with a low growl to it as I stared at the source.

There was a…island? Smaller than an island, but a decent chunk of land floating in the sky with a large plant on it, its roots even hanging out the bottom. I almost wanted to call it a tree, but it was probably not a tree if you were to be scientific about it.

Regardless, It had a massive eye that opened up and many different appendages with mouths and razor sharp teeth.

"You heard the brat, get ready for a fight!" Nurarihyon roared, treating the matter seriously.

Roars and cheers resounded in equal measure. Sure, this wasn't the first 'real' fight, but last time, that was just them showing dominance. This time, they would be fighting.

"Shield!" I roared out as the Magics of the ship activated and the innate Bounded Fields sprang into existence, hundreds, thousands of small projectiles collided with it.

The same 'seeds' as before, fast and strong enough to shatter concrete, they all slammed into my defenses.

Many of them started trying to burrow into the Magical Shield.

"Nurarihyon, how many Magic users did you bring?" I looked at him.

"A handful, whatcha need?"

"Layered shields, I need at least a few inches between each one, these things are eating Magical Power."

"Yuna, get out here with your sisters!" Nurarihyon hollered over the sound of my barriers taking a barrage as the ship continued to fly fast towards the giant plant in the distance.

Were those Yuuki Onna?

"Boss whatcha need?" They came up from below deck amidst the running around, she blew out a puff of smoke from a long pipe she held in her hand, her kimono slightly ajar so you could almost make out her pale cleavage.

"I need Magical barriers deployed, at least an inch apart, layered behind mine." I didn't wait for Nurarihyon to explain and quickly blurted it out.

"Do as the kid says."

"Girls." A cold air swept up around them as I could see More Magical Barriers emerge just below me with a fair bit of distance between them.

Were those Elemental Barriers – obviously Ice in nature – but still, those were more difficult to make than a non-elementally aligned Bounded Field.

My initial Barrier was breached as the new sprouts dug through them, then they started to freeze upon touching the Yuuki Onna's barriers.

Granted, it only slowed them down as they whittled away on the Magical Energy.

"You said they eat Magic? What about Youjutsu?" Aotab? asked.

"Let's see, there's another barrage coming." I offered him.

Aotab? grunted and walked towards the front, his cursed power enveloped his body like flames and he reeled his fist back and threw a punch towards another barrage of 'seeds' shooting at us.

His flames consumed them, burning them to a crisp, well all but a few.

A handful that made it through, he snatched one through the air and let his flames dance around it and the Seed in question couldn't resist it at all.

It made sense I suppose, Fae are Magical in nature, Youjutsu was an entirely different spectrum.

"Well, I'm also not one to get fired upon and not retaliate." I pointed my sword towards the massive plant. "Fire front cannons!"

It was more for everyone else's benefit that I even said it out loud as the Cannons charged up and fired.

Beams of Fire tore through the sky, searing away parts of the massive plant, leaving flames and broken vines in its wake.

A shrill cry could be heard even from this distance as the Plant furiously expanded in size, its appendages growing and replicating at insane speeds.

"Hoh, looks like it isn't going down so easily." Nurarihyon mused, clutching his cane sword.

Something rose up from behind the plant, a bird, a rather large one.

Another rose up, a different bird, this one had two heads. Then a Tiger of all things shot up in the air and it had some type of wings on it. Various different animals and creatures all took to the sky around the massive plant.

Though they all had one thing in common, they had a peculiar plant growing out of their bodies in some place.

It was a parasite and the animals were hosts

That's…..troubling.

There were easily over a thousand of those host animals that flew towards us with reckless abandon.

The Plant seemed to have some sort of intelligence because it realized just shooting those seeds at us wasn't going to work anymore and I now realized why it was doing so.

It was simply the easiest method to spread its parasites to other organisms.

I really don't want to know what the ground was like below us.

I was ready to take out my Bow of Auriel, but Nurarihyon grabbed my arm, as if reading my intention.

"Let me and my boys in on the action." He smiled.

I relented immediately. "Why don't I show you something neat about the ship?" He looked at me questionably, and I tapped on the flooring. Mist began to noticeably appear around us, shrouding us in it completely.

Nurarihyon slapped my shoulder. "Alright brat, this is your first time running with the Hyakki Yagy? despite joining awhile ago. What do you think boys? Let's show our newest member how it's done?"

There were a bunch of laughs and cheers despite the situation.

Nurarihyon just as well, he started to release a sort of….mist. I had seen it before, and it was a phenomenon often associated with him and the Hyakki Yagy?.

I found myself smiling. "Just don't fly too far away from the ship, it's sort of our anchor point. And I think the mist will obscure us as I'm fairly sure this thing tracks Magic." I said no more and simply followed with Nurarihyon as he jumped out into the mist.

Dozens more jumped off the edge of the ship without hesitation.

Nurarihyon seemed to have usurped the mist my ship produced, something that was just an aesthetic that Odin added for a laugh, it now turned into a weapon because we were not obstructed by it in the slightest.

Despite perceiving the mist in front of me, I could see through it entirely.

Nurarihyon's sword flashed, and the first creature that touched the mist was decapitated. But that didn't deter the oncoming tide in the slightest as they held both a madness in their eyes and a look of death.

Different members of the Hyakki Yagy? popped out. A Tengu covered in scars, stabbed through the mists, piercing a large bird and tore its body apart with a feral grin on his face, blood splashing everywhere.

The Yuuki Onna from before, they utilized their Youjutsu this time, and many different animals fell from the sky, frozen in chunks of ice or every inch of their body impaled with ice spikes.

An Oni with a massive club slammed it down on what looked like a turtle with wings, demolishing its body.

Aotab? was at the front, his cursed flames spread out, turning dozens into ash in short moments.

I joined into the fray, my sword swinging out as I fired off Sword Phantoms on the oncoming creatures.

"There's something wrong with them!" I heard a Youkai shout at my side.

He held the wing of a bird in one hand and its main body in the other as vines emerged from its wounds, trying to push into the Youkai's body, his Youjutsu holding it off.

Nurarihyon was quick to his side, cutting up the creature's vine parts into tiny pieces as they fell to the ground.

It started to become obvious that this was simply a suicide tactic to try and parasitize more creatures from the Plant's part.

Nurarihyon's expression changed into a sneer and he got pissed. "This damn plant is trying to mess with my boys!?" His Youjutsu exploded out and curled around his sword, a simple swing of it and hundreds of those flying parasitized creatures were turned into thousands of pieces as blood rained from the sky.

The Giant plant we were quickly approaching, the top of it unfurled, as if blooming. It's single eye stared at us, words didn't need to be spoken to know its feelings.

It seemed to be struggling with something as the ground below shook, like an earthquake rippled through.

The ground cracked and shattered, a chasm opening and an utterly massive hand pushed through, grabbing at the edges.

The hand itself was large enough to grab the ship entirely and squeeze it into pulp.

That thing was massive. Based on the size of just its hand, I would give it about the same size as Surtr, maybe even larger.

It slowly pulled itself out, its head coming into view, or what remained of it. Part of it was made entirely of vines, other parts you could see the vines wiggling beneath the surface.

My only thought was that a Giant somehow found itself in the Fae Realm by accident, and either died or got taken over by this plant and the plant parasitized it.

It was enough that everyone stopped what they were doing to look at it.

"Sadao!" Nurarihyon roared.

Honestly, I completely forgot about his second chair.

The super buff Kappa walked to the bow of the ship and jumped off right towards the giant.

Sadao's Touki and Youjutsu burst out and he reeled a single muscular arm back and it enlarged to the point where it could only be called small when compared to a literal giant.

I could feel the Youkai's power from here.

It all accumulated at his fist that he threw at the face of the Giant. A titanic shockwave burst out from the sheer force of the punch, sending the giant back down into the pit it was crawling out from with a force that a real earthquake spread out across the horizon.

Suffice to say, the Giant didn't appear again.

Sadao looked a bit drained as a fellow Youkai swooped down and caught him, bringing him back up to the ship.

He gave a shaky thumbs up to everyone amidst the cheers.

"What the fuck did I just see." I whispered.

Nurarihyon laughed. "Let's go deal with the big Vegetable."

Said Vegetable, despite the momentary pause where I assume it was processing that its massive monster was defeated. Its vines, its other appendages with mouths themselves, they increased and grew again, hundreds of them whipping about as the ship approached.

They shot out, colliding with the ship's shields as I fired the cannons once more, eliciting another shrill cry from the plant.

The Youkai took this opportunity to jump off again, stepping into either the floating land mass or the plant itself, running up its large vines.

I joined in naturally. I used a burst of Shunpo to hop over to a vine about the size of my ship and began running across it.

Dozens or so of those mouth-like appendages tried to chomp down on me, but a wave of my sword sent them sailing through the air. Unfortunately, they seemed to sprout more 'limbs' and shot at me, needing a more thorough method of destruction.

My Bloodline sparked to life and I disintegrated them as they got close, grabbing my Sword of Destruction quickly and alighting it with just well.

I stabbed the sword into the vine, my Power of Destruction burst out and I pulled, dragging it upwards as I followed along with all the others as they all approached the 'head'.

The place where it bloomed, where that singular eye rested.

It didn't take a genius to guess that spot being its 'weakness' or 'core'.

Pieces of its body were severed, destroyed, burned and frozen.

"Brat, Aotab?, with me! Everyone else, back to the ship!" Nurarihyon shouted, disappearing in a haze and reappearing near the top, narrowly avoiding a rather large mouth vine appendage, only for it to be sliced off just as quickly as it passed.

Both Aotab? and myself scaled the massive plant, the cannons from my ship firing off, pulverizing parts of its body that blocked the way with the occasional bolt of lightning courtesy of Sir Wiggles.

As we got up, Nurarihyon's body turned hazy again, but rather than disappear, the wrinkles on his skin disappeared, and a full head of hair could be seen faintly.

He looked young again, a rather cocky grin adorning his face.

The same sword he held turned sideways and he gripped it with both hands, his Youjutsu swirled around it violently and he swung his sword.

The Massive Plant, it's main body was thick, thicker than the Giant's arm had been, yet in one clean motion, it was falling, completely severed from its base.

He didn't need to tell us what to do.

Aotab?'s cursed flames burst out in intensity enough to match my own Power of Destruction in sheer display.

Both destructive and corrosive forces collided into the main body of the plant monster, the shrill cry of it a call of death as its remains wafted away in the wind.

However, there still remained a significant amount of appendages and vines it had created that didn't just conveniently turn to ash upon what was supposed to be its main body getting destroyed.

I grabbed Aotab? and used Shunpo to slide back onto the deck of the ship with Nurarihyon's graceful steps following closely behind as his hazy youth fading back into old age.

He put a hand on his back like it was hurting, but he didn't voice it.

"It's a good thing we went ahead, this would have been a nuisance if Yasaka marched with the army." Nurarihyon noted.

The Vines that tried to hold onto the ship had long been destroyed as we were free to leave, however, it's best not to leave a mess uncleaned.

"I believe it's only right to return the previous favor." I held a hand out, forming a Runic circle at the tip of my finger, dozens, hundreds more appeared above and around me.

"Let me tell you our motto, brat." He put a hand on my shoulder as it seemed many faces I didn't immediately recognize came out of the proverbial woodwork. Those who didn't participate directly in battle but looked rather pissed off themselves. "Good or bad, Debts are returned tenfold! And never duel when you can gang up!" He laughed.

There were many Youkai who were adept at ranged attacks, they stepped forward and all took aim at the floating island and what remained of the plant.

Along with my ship cannons, and my own Runic Circles that crackled with lightning, they all began firing.

The floating island began to crumble as fires flashed across the various plants that remained, lightning tore through the earth, the elements rained down, and an uncountable number of curses seeped into the vitality of what remained, churning it from inside-out.

It wasn't until the last chunk of dirt fell from the sky that the attacks finally ceased.

Nurarihyon raised his hand up and they cheered triumphantly. It was a satisfying victory for them that was sorely needed after holding back for months until this point.

Yeah, it was a good thing we went ahead. This could have caused some catastrophic damage to the army if none of us caught it in time.

No idea what it actually was, but it's a good thing it's dead.

I eyed a few guys bringing up some barrels of what I assumed were Alcohol.

Oh well, it's their first true 'fight' and 'victory' since invading beyond the show of force form before.

I wouldn't tell them no.

@***@

The remainder of the…flight didn't have nearly as much excitement. Beyond scaring away some unsavory things with a payload of cannon fire, nothing really stood in our way as we continued onwards.

When Vivian spoke of a lighthouse, I didn't really know what to expect.

It was only until we reached this point that I understood now.

It was a strange building, golden and ostentatious in design. From the topmost, there was a crystal that propelled a beam of light upwards and disappeared into the aurora that danced in the sky.

I gestured to Sir Wiggles and we started to lower as we got closer.

Eventually, the Ship landed around the…peripheral, and I could really see how large this 'Lighthouse' really was.

Around the Lighthouse, well, there was a farm.

I jumped off the 'docked' ship, along with Nurarihyon as we walked towards the singular person present.

Vivian said that you needed payment to come and go, and I wasn't going to immediately just decapitate any Fae I ran into.

It was an old man, very old.

Eyebrows that would make the Captain Commander back in Soul Society jealous, along with a hefty white beard that went down to his waist. He wore a strange getup, what looked like a faded red jacket of some sort and a faded red hat.

His most notable feature was the hook on his right hand as he used it to whittle at a piece of wood.

Looking around, I made sure to take in everything I saw. Besides the Lighthouse, and the farm, there was a rather large…graveyard.

I hesitated to honestly call it a graveyard because they were rather shallow graves….freshly shallow graves.

I could tell because body parts were poking out.

"Are you – " I was cut off due to a strange noise.

An arm poking out of a shallow grave trembled. "Ahhhuhhhh." Something buried there groaned.

The man, the old man slowly got up from the chair he was sitting in, he grabbed a shovel he had at this side and slowly walked over to the grave and earnestly began to slap at whatever was there with the shovel until it quieted and went limp.

As if nothing happened, he slowly walked back, setting the shovel back where it was before and sitting back down.

"Ya want to pass through, ya gotta pay the toll…." His voice – aged, wary, tired.

"What's the price?" I asked pointedly.

"Whatever ya want." He pointed at a box – a crate not far away. "Just put it in there and be on ya way."

"….what's stopping someone from not paying?"

Below his bear, and his large eyebrows, his eyes became visible as his eyebrows raised and a toothy grin showed through. "Who ya think also controls the lighthouse on the other side?"

Noted.

"And what happens if the price isn't satisfactory?" I asked, skeptical about this whole thing.

He shrugged. "Whatever I feel like."

I narrowed my eyes because this felt….odd. Well, Fae were odd, but his behavior felt odd in comparison to the Fae I've met and then it dawned on me. "Are you….human?"

"Who knows anymore." He didn't outright deny it, even basically confirmed it.

A human controlled the Lighthouse?

It seemed like a rather strategic point of interest.

"Do you want to leave here?" I asked abruptly.

He paused his whittling, his tired eyes looked up at me. "Leave?"

"The Fae Realm, back to the human world." I offered. "No price, no bargains. Humans should live in the human world."

"Are you human, son?"

"Half." I said. "Not Fae though."

His hand trembled as he slowly caressed his hook. After several moments, he simply shook his head. "What year is it on the outside?"

"About a decade past 2000." I replied.

He looked up and I think I saw a few tears in his eyes. "How the world must have changed. There's probably no one outside that remembers my name. Your payment was received, you're free to go inside. Follow up towards the sky, the sea you're going to isn't like the ones outside, son be wary. There be more than Fairies there." He was oddly more articulate than before.

He said payment was received, but I still walked over to his 'box' and deposited all manner of things inside. Food, drinks, alcohol.

I think he could see everything because he laughed rather maniacally. I'm pretty sure he had a screw or two loose, but I couldn't blame him for how long he probably lived in this place.

"My name." He spoke up as I was about to turn and walk away. "Will ya remember it if I tell ya? I want someone to remember me."

"I'll remember it." I nodded to him.

He had a strangely content smile. "I'm starting to forget a lot of things. Humans aint supposed to live this long, son. I don't want my name to be forgotten, and I refuse to hand it over to some fairy." He spat onto the ground. "I used to be a Captain. Captain James Bartholomew Hook. Remember it…please."

I paused because I recognized it.

"I'll remember it." I repeated again and turned to walk back to the ship.

Nurarihyon silently walked at my side, not feeling the need to speak up until we reboarded and I took over the wheel from Sir Wiggles.

The Ship floated upwards, as if caught in a current, it slid into the beam of light that pointed to the sky.

"You recognized his name, I could see it on your face. Someone we should be wary of?"

I shook my head. "Have you ever heard of the Peter Pan story?"

"The Children's tale?" He stroked his beard

"Do you recall the name of the Antagonist?" I asked him.

"….oh." He blinked in realization, looking a mite somber in processing that.

I pushed that thought to the side because the ship was pulled by the beam of light and rather quickly, the sky opened up and the stars moved aside as a massive Ocean came into view.

Well, time to start pirating.

@***@

A/N

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